Disneybounding 101

Ah, Disneybounding. One of the best and most controversial trends to pop up in recent years. Personally, I love it, but some people are divided on the topic, since there’s such a wide spectrum of possibilities.

 

For those who don’t spend all their time in Disney parks and feel a little out of the loop, Disneybounding was created by a blogger named Leslie Kay. Its a specific style of dressing in a manner influenced by a Disney character, film, or attraction. For instance, if I wear a yellow skirt, a navy top, and a red bow in my hair, I can be fairly identifiable as Snow White. It’s a great way to compromise when you can’t fully dress up to go to the parks.

 

Why can’t you dress up for the parks? That’s a great question! There’s a rule in place that no one over the age of fourteen can dress up for the parks. A lot of people think that’s unfair, but it’s really a great rule. Let’s say that five-year-old Jenny goes to Magic Kingdom for the first time, and she’s so excited to meet Cinderella. So they get to Fairytale Hall, and it’s a forty-five minute wait, and Dad isn’t too excited about that. But wait! A teenage girl in a Cinderella dress is standing outside Fairytale Hall. Close enough! Dad sends little Jenny up there, and Cinderella puts her phone away long enough to take a picture and scribble an autograph. But that’s not the same. It’s not the same at all. And imagine this- if Jenny goes up to “Cinderella” and the princess swears at her and says she’s just trying to have fun and leave her alone. Jenny would be heartbroken, right? Disney magic ruined. So yeah. Save your costumes for Not So Scary, when the party wristband can set you apart from the real characters. Maintain character integrity!

 

So that’s where Disneybounding comes in. It’s a great way to “dress up” as those beloved characters (or even attractions!) without being in full costume. The best way to do that is to pull from the color schemes of the characters- yellow, navy, and red for Snow; aqua, purple, and red for Ariel; red and white polka dots for Minnie Mouse. You get the idea. A lot can be done with makeup and hairstyles as well, although wigs should be avoided. Not only does that send you into costuming territory, but really, y’all. It’s Florida. It’s swampland. Y’all are gonna sweat to death.

 

Another way to pull inspiration is through accessories. I’ve used a necklace with a gold comb on it for Rapunzel, and a necklace with a thimble on it for Wendy. A lot of Etsy sellers create beautiful bows, custom ears, and themed flower crowns as well that can make you intsagram ready in no time. Some of my favorite shops are Ever After Bowtique, Soundsation Ears, and Magic by Courtney; all three of those shops are run by fabulous ladies who do good work.

 

But Caitlin, you say, have you ever Disneybounded? Have I ever! Here’s some examples.

 

I put together a Disneybound pajama outfit for the 24 hour day at Magic Kingdom the one year I went (RIP, but mostly RIP to the cast members who worked all night). I wore a white tunic from Target, lavender leggings from Walmart, and cream lace shoes from Payless. I made the flower crown myself, and the satchel was a gift from my friend Carrie (Pascal was hers but she lent him to me for the night). Her pajamas bound was even cuter- green plaid pajamas and bear slippers, because she was Merida!

My hipster Kylo Ren disneybound is probably my all time favorite. The dress is one of my faavorite Modcloth purchases, the Bells of London, Ohio dress made by Dear Creatures. I wore it with black low top converse style shoes and made myself a flower crown- the best part is the hidden Darth Vader.

I had a blast running around Studios and taking pictures, especially when I went to Starbucks. I had a conversation that went like this:

 

Barista: What’s your name?

 

Me: Can you please…can you please write Kyle Lauren on it?

 

Barista: …

 

Me: …

 

Barista: Okay.

 

So then flash forward to when they’re calling my name.

 

Barista: I have a venti peach green tea lemonade for…Kyle Lauren?

 

There was a dad wearing a Star Wars shirt leaning against the bar. He looked at the cup, then me, then back at the cup, and he started laughing hysterically. “Come on!” he chortled. “Kyle Lauren! Kylo Ren! It’s so funny!” Thank you, random dad. The barista might have looked at me like I had twelve heads, but I appreciate your laughter.

On St. Patrick’s Day a while back a bunch of us met up in our best green disneybounds. I chose to go as Pascal, so I wore a green dress from Pink Rose, a brown Faded Glory belt, a pair of Nicole sandals from Ross, and a Forever 21 flower crown that had been admittedly rather sparse, but I spruced it up with some extra blooms left over from another project.

Elsa is always one of my favorite cosplay choices, especially when my sister and I are disneybounding together. For Frozen Fever Elsa, I wore an aqua tank and white shorts and a flower crown made by my sister. As an extra surprise, she ordered the Frozen Fever bows from our favorite Etsy shop, Ever After Bowtique, and added them to the backs of our crowns. You can also see that Lindsay went a little more intense with her disneybound- she cosplays as Anna and has made three of her outfits so far, so she wore the vest from her Frozen Fever cosplay, but styled it with street clothes.

Our first Anna and Elsa Disneybound was a lot more intense. This was when the movie had only been out for a few months and the princesses were at their first meet and greet location in Epcot. Lindsay usually likes to wear wigs, so she wore her Anna wig, but the rest of her outfit was clearly street clothes in Anna-inspired colors, which balances out. I wore a dress from Ross and sparkly shoes, and we both wore the park tiaras. I also styled my hair and makeup to be Elsa-inspired.

For another example, I custom ordered a beautiful set of holiday Anna and Elsa bows (also from Ever After) for me and my sister. To be super honest, I don’t have any full photos of our outfits and I don’t remember what we wearing, but aren’t these bows cute? Amber custom made them after I had a terrible experience ordering from Caleigh’s Crowns (which has now closed), and not only was she brilliant to work with, she delivered them to us personally in cute holiday gift bags with candy canes!

I don’t always disneybound as just Elsa- this was my adorable Kristoff inspired outfit! I wore an embroidered peasant top and a gray skirt, both from Forever 21, navy leggings, my black Hamish boots from Blowfish, and my Kristoff bow from Ever After Bowtique. And of course I posed with a troll. I think that’s like a rule or something.

This is a sweet and simple Alice in Wonderland disneybound- a blue dress from Target, a white lace top from Forever 21, a blue bow from Ever After Bowtique, and my trusty iCarly sandals. It was cute, comfortable, and just identifiable enough.

Dapper Day is another great opportunity for subtle disneybounds! I’ve documented my Queen of Hearts, Queen Elinor, Rapunzel, and Wendy themed outfits before, but my very first one was a simple disneybound of the house from Up. I wore the Air of Adorable dress from Modcloth with the same Modcloth oxfords I wore for Rapunzel, plus a small petticoat, the Grape Soda pin, and a borrowed vintage hat. It was subtle, but effective.

You don’t even have to be at Disney for a disneybound! I went to Unviersal in a Hogwarts student disneybound (who else is a Hufflepuff?) I wore my Record Time dress in black from Modcloth, a yellow coat from Forever 21, black tights, black combat boots from Charlotte Russe, and a black hair bow from Forever 21. It was a great time (and my wand fit in my coat pocket!)

Here’s another example of a more subtle disneybound. I bought my sister these matching shirts from Tee Public for Christmas, and we styled them to be the stepsisters from Cinderella. She wore a lime green tank, aqua shorts, and an aqua bow to be Drizella, and I wore purple shorts and a pink bow to be Anastasia. (Even better, our mother disneybounded as the stepmother! We don’t have any pictures, unfortunately.)

And just for fun, here’s one of my favorite meet and greets in a Disney inspired outfit. I wore my Arendelle crest shirt from Tee Public and my Kristoff bow from Ever After for a VIP meet and greet at the Frozen singalong for my birthday. Clearly I had a little bit of fun (and was super embarrassingly excited to meet Kristoff!)

What are some of your favorite Disneybounds? Do you have any tips, tricks, or rules for disneybounding? Comment below if you want to see a follow up blog or video about disneynounds, and maybe you’ll be featured!

 

Astrid Hofferson from How to Train Your Dragon

The only way I can describe this is “Princess Astrid.” Really.

I love How to Train Your Dragon, so for Not So Scary in 2015 I decided to make a costume inspired by her. Her full outfit was going to be impractical, especially for Florida (faux fur! Leather! weaponry!) so I designed a one piece dress reminiscent of Astrid using my trusty Simplicity 1873 as a base.

The bodice is made of a red brocade that I bought online. Sadly it is far too shiny in person and I wasn’t happy with it at all. I also wasn’t happy with the faux lacing- the neckline sits too high and the waistline sits too low, making me seem lumpy and uneven. The sleeves were fairly simple though; I used cream cotton from my stash and stitched on brown ribbon to look like the lacing of her arm guards.

The skirt was a brown cotton that I originally purchased for my Vanellope Von Schweetz cosplay (although I found a much better fabric later). I used a wide burlap ribbon to cover the waist and stitched stripes of narrow burlap ribbon onto the skirt to look like the fur and leather panels. I tracked down skull buttons on Ali Express that literally arrived at the last possible second.

The headband was a length of brown twill belting with elastic stitched to the center, and I wore navy Walmart leggings and my Rocketdog boots. Super classy, eh?

Here’s where I really messed up, though. Because…I’m a procrastinator. A really dreadful procrastinator. I waited until the day of Not So Scary to get started on my project. And I slept in too. And also I was working on my friend’s Belle costume, which I hadn’t completed either. I am literally THE WORST. I cried. Often. And I wasn’t happy with the final products of either cosplay. But oh well. We still made it to Be Our Guest on time (so Bri got to eat at the castle while dressed as Belle) and we still had a great time at the party. Will I wear my Astrid dress again? Not without significant changes. But at least we had a good time!

My mom still teases me because this is the one place I tried to run away in when she took me to Disney when I was five. HAHA MOM YOU CAN’T TEASE ME ANYMORE. (Also, it seems appropriate that I was disneybounding as Kylo Ren for this photo.) (at Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: Movie Set Adventure)

Dress: Bells of London, Ohio dress from Modcloth

Sneakers: Faded Glory

Flower Crown: handmade

Went a little retro to see The Iron Giant in theaters tonight!! Bless @skipperkimberly for holding my hand while I sobbed though the last fifteen minutes. (At least I warned her in advance that I’d be bawling in my popcorn? #crybaby) (at AMC Downtown Disney 24)

Shirt: Ross

Shorts: Mossimo

Shoes: Faded Glory

Rocking both my gorgeous @whositswhatsits Reverse the Curse top and my beautiful custom Great Movie Ride bow from @extrasweetbowtique in front of my Disney home. #mediatourguide #22minutesofmovierelatedenchantment #greatmovieride (at The Great Movie Ride)

Look of the Day: Rainy Days

Oh, it’s so gloomy today. Blech. That means it’s the perfect day for neon lips and a neon heart sweater, right?

Of course, a rainy and humid day means poofy, frizzy hair. Double blech. Anyone have hair suggestions? At the moment, I just let it air dry and spritzed with leave in conditioner, and used an anti-frizz cream. Somehow I don’t think it’s working.

Makeup Tutorial: Spring Makeup Neon Pop by missglamorazzi

Is this the first missglamorazzi tutorial I’ve done? I think it is! I love her videos so much, though. She was the first beauty blogger I discovered and I literally spent my spring break watching all of her videos and taking copious notes. It’s a little sad how many notes I took.

Anyways, the focal point for this is the neon lips, but personally I’m not sure how I feel about the neon on my face. It could just be that I’m not used to seeing bright lipstick on myself, though. And it’s not nearly as vibrant in the pictures as it is on my face!

Maybe I just need to get used to neon stuff.

Outfit:
Top: Forever 21
Shorts: Faded Glory
Flipflops: Disney World!

———

Face:
Maybelline Dream Fresh BB cream
Nyx concealer stick in Porcelain
Maybelline Dream Matte Powder in Cream
Hard Candy baked blush in Living Doll

———

Eyes:
Maybelline Color Tattoo in Bad to the Bronze
Covergirl trio in Shimmering Sands (middle shade)
Covergirl liquiliner in brown
Covergirl Clump Crusher mascara

———

Lips:
Mox lip butter in Pomegranate and Fig (Birchbox sample)
Maybelline Vivids in Shocking Coral

———

Perfume: Harajuku Lovers in Love

Nail Polish: Sephora by OPI in Miss Bossy Pants (from the Glee collection)

Is there a tutorial you want me to try or a product you want me to review? Ask me here!

Sick Day

10/3/12

This outfit is a million times cuter in person, I swear.

Anyways, this is a warm, comfy outfit- perfect for a day like today. Some kind of 24 hour bug hit me in full force like a mack truck just as my class was starting. By the time rehearsal was over, I was exhausted and hot and shaky. I somehow managed the 45 minute drive home and stumbled into bed. Luckily, I went to bed and woke up feeling better. Still not 100%, but better.

At least I had a cute and comfy outfit to wear! I love pairing navy and yellow together, and the boots are so much fun.

Dress: Pink Rose via Ross
Cardigan: Forever 21
Jeggings: Target
Belt: Faded Glory
Boots: Rocketdog via eBay

Nail Polish: OPI At First Sight
Perfume of the Day: Vera Wang Glam Princess

The 8th Von Trapp

Untitled

I am a SUCKER for anything with a sailor collar. I don’t even know why. I think it has something to do with my childhood obsession with my American Girl Samantha doll and my yearning for the my-size copy of her summer middy dress. But in any case, I love this dress.

Originally I came across this dress in the Memorial Day clearance sale. It was at least 50% off and I got super excited, but all they had left was a size small. I’m rather big of boob, so I always buy a size large in Forever 21 to accommodate the bazoombas and then take in the waist from there. So there was no way a small was going to fit. I mean, seriously. Snowball’s chance in hell. So I let it go.

Imagine my delight when it turned up in my size on eBay! I sniped that baby at the last minute and have treasured it ever since. It’s a wee bit on the short side, but I don’t even care. It’s so cute and so comfy.

I wore this for Narnia rehearsal- we’ve been trying to run act two and it is a HOT MESS. Well, actually, it’s not that bad, but my kiddos won’t focus and they get super silly, and it’s not as tight and clean as act one is. We’ll get there, though. They’re sweet kids and they work really hard when they set their mind to it, so hopefully it’ll all turn out.

Dress: Forever 21 via eBay
Leggings: Faded Glory
Boots: Rocketdog via eBay

Nail Polish: OPI Katy Perry Teenage Dream
Perfume of the Day: Bath and Body Works Dreamy Vanilla Woods

Bad Hair Day

10/17/12: Bad Hair Day

What is up with my hair? It’s all weird and frizzy and junk. Maybe it’s just still recovering from the hardcore dye process. Poor hair. Tomorrow I’ll put it up and condition the crap out of it.

This is my new favorite pair of shoes! I’ve been admiring the Blowfish Garrens on my favorite fashion blogger (Kaelah from Little Chief Honeybee) for ages, and finally snagged a pair on eBay for dirt cheap! They’re so incredibly comfortable. They actually meet my standard for comfort- they’re comfy enough to wear to a Disney park! (After being a cast member for four years, I learned a lot about wearing proper footwear while in Disney.)

I made this skirt last year for teacher clothes, and it’s one of my most-worn pieces that I’ve sewn! The print is very Anthropologie-esque (at least in my mind…) and the pattern is super easy to construct- I made it in about two hours, including the hem. So if you’re looking for a simple gathered skirt pattern, I highly recommend New Look 6872!

Speaking of sewing, I started working on costumes for the school production of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. I moved my sewing machine to my work desk and basically set up a sweatshop for myself. Mrs. Beaver’s apron is done and her dress is underway!

Top: Thrifted
Skirt: Handmade (New Look 6872)
Shoes: Blowfish Garrens via eBay
Belt: Faded Glory

Nail Polish: OPI You Don’t Know Jacques!
Perfume of the Day: Vera Wang Glam Princess